How Jim Wehmeier’s St. Louis team takes 90% of 140 transactions from referral

Ren Jones00:00

Welcome to Roadmap. How to take three listings a week until you’re ready for more. Each week we interview a great agent that is consistently taking two, three, four listings a week. And we have an exciting guest today. We encourage you to take notes and apply as much of their knowledge as quickly as you can, and then use the copycat principle. If you’re watching on Vulcan7 or the Lead Gen Facebook group, you’ll have an opportunity to ask questions during the broadcast. And folks, please get those questions in early. Type those questions in early. Let me introduce my co-host from Cincinnati, Ohio, Jenn Merlin.

Jenn Merlin00:40

Hello.

Ren Jones00:41

And that would be Team Synergi with an i.com. Team, S Y N E R G i.com.

Jenn Merlin00:47

You got it.

Ren Jones00:48

How’s real estate business, Jenn?

Jenn Merlin00:50

It depends. You buying or selling?

Ren Jones00:52

I love it. You got that one down there. I love it. She’s got that script down. Alrighty, so let’s talk about the Vulcan7 challenge before we introduce our guests. Vulcan7 challenge is, once a month shadow a great agent and another market. Our guests, that’s what they’ve been doing.

Jenn Merlin01:09

They’re perfect…

Ren Jones01:09

No, they’ve been doing it and that’s why they’re rocking and rolling. Once a month shadow a great agent in another market that’s taking two, three, four listings a week average, either drive three or four hours to another market or fly there. Even better. Get there in the afternoon, have dinner with them if they are available. Get to their office early in the morning, shadow them all morning, take notes, record what they say, go to lunch with them, and then head home.

01:32At the end of a year, doing that once a month, at the end of a year, you’ll have 12 new friends who are very successful and you will quickly become one of them. Before I introduce our guests today, I want to remind everybody that we are also simulcasting the show on the private Lead Gen group on Facebook. Lead Gen has 48,000, probably 49,000 by now, members. So we have a large audience there as well today. We’ll be pausing for a commercial message during the show as a thank you to the Lead Gen folks. Let’s welcome our guest today from St. Louis. St. Louis. Louie. Jim Waymire.

Jim Wehmeier02:08

How’s it going guys?

Ren Jones02:12

And Ryan.

Jenn Merlin02:13

Yay.

Brian02:13

Hello.

Ren Jones02:15

Welcome guys.

Brian02:16

Welcome. Thank you.

Jim Wehmeier02:18

How you guys doing?

Ren Jones02:19

Glad you’re here. Great.

Jenn Merlin02:19

Great.

Jim Wehmeier02:19

Glad to be here.

Ren Jones02:21

How’s business?

Brian02:23

Very good. Busy.

Ren Jones02:25

Good. Now, there are a lot of people watching right now that have somebody that needs to either sell a home there or needs to buy a home there. How can they reach you to start doing some business later this afternoon?

Brian02:38

They can reach us at TNGSTL.com. And that’s The Nation’s Group. It’s our team name.

Ren Jones02:46

TNGSTL.com. So that’s the website?

Brian02:48

That is the website.

Ren Jones02:50

Okay. So they’ll learn all about you and be able to reach you through that as well?

Brian02:54

Absolutely.

Ren Jones02:55

Perfect. Okay, good. Fantastic. So folks, not right now, wait till the show’s over, then reach out to them and get that process going. Good deal. So what’s the goal this year, folks?

Jim Wehmeier03:11

200 units, if we keep track on our sale price, we’ll be a little above 40 million.

Ren Jones03:19

Nice. Nice, nice, nice.

Jenn Merlin03:21

What’d you do last year?

Jim Wehmeier03:22

So last year we were at 33.3 at 140 units.

Ren Jones03:27

Okay, super. And Jen was asking about a stretch goal.

Jenn Merlin03:31

Yeah.

Ren Jones03:32

You had another?

Jim Wehmeier03:33

Everyone has a stretch goal, I hope. Our stretch goal is 260 this year.

Ren Jones03:39

Perfect.

Jim Wehmeier03:40

So we’re really hammering down on 200 and then when we do reach the 260, we’ll celebrate.

Jenn Merlin03:50

What are you focusing on to get to that 200 that you did differently than last year?

Jim Wehmeier03:52

Okay. So a big thing that we actually have added, and this is what Brian’s doing now, is a full-time ISA. He’s head of our Lead Gen department. We’ve had other things, but out of our 140 transaction, 90% comes from referral. So we’re really good at keeping in contact and doing a very good job with our clients that they feel comfortable enough to give us their family, their friends. And when we like that 90%, we need other, I guess, spigots that we can turn on and off for Lead Gen to give us more opportunity. There’s so many more people that we haven’t met than we’ve met, so we have to reach out in front of them.

Ren Jones04:40

Good. You talking to the database pretty much and he’s working with the the people you don’t know?

Jenn Merlin04:47

Not yet.

Jim Wehmeier04:48

Right.

Brian04:49

We’re getting there.

Jim Wehmeier04:51

We have, on our team, we now have three… Well, we licensed agents on our team. So.

Jenn Merlin04:59

Do they do buyers and sellers or…

Jim Wehmeier05:02

So I am the listing agent, so I handle all the listings. So out of 140 transactions, 72 of them last year were listings.

Jenn Merlin05:09

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier05:10

And then the other two are buyers agents.

Jenn Merlin05:13

And what does the administrative team look like?

Jim Wehmeier05:16

So we have a transaction coordinator, head of operations, and then a listing coordinator also.

Jenn Merlin05:23

Okay. I know a lot of people… Oh, sorry, go ahead.

Jim Wehmeier05:26

A junior sales associate. So she’s in training. She’s actually shadowing me on a lot of things, so.

Jenn Merlin05:31

Cool.

Jim Wehmeier05:32

We’re getting there.

Ren Jones05:32

Good.

Jenn Merlin05:34

So I know a lot of people…

Jim Wehmeier05:35

We always need talent too, so if anybody’s watching, feel free to reach out.

Jenn Merlin05:40

Perfect.

Ren Jones05:41

So you said you shadowed Adam Hergenrother. Are you doing any listing appointments in the office?

Jim Wehmeier05:47

Not yet. I don’t know that I’m at that level. I guess it’s my limiting belief. I need to see the house first, so I would really need to shadow how he presents that meeting with them as opposed to what I do in their house, or what normal agents do in their house. So.

Ren Jones06:13

Gotcha. Okay.

Jenn Merlin06:16

A lot of people are adding ISAs or they’re talking about it. How do you set up the goals for that person and how are they… Give us a little bit about how they’re compensated.

Brian06:26

So the way we do it is we give them a small base salary so they have something to live off of and then they are paid off of nurtures. So a nurture for us is somebody that is willing to buy or sell in the next 12 months.

Jenn Merlin06:40

Okay.

Brian06:40

They’re willing to make contact with the team and continue conversations with the team. So basically somebody that’s willing to interact with us before they actually sign something. Then their goal is to get appointments.

Jenn Merlin06:53

Obviously.

Brian06:54

Everybody’s goal is to get appointments. Every appointment that they set that closes, they will get a percentage of the closing at the end.

Jenn Merlin07:02

Okay. And then once he sets up the nurture, then they interact with one of the agents or they continue to interact with the ISA until the appointment is set?

Brian07:10

It depends. Depends on where the person is. Most of the time the ISA will continue to talk to them until they’re ready for the appointment.

Jenn Merlin07:18

Okay.

Brian07:18

So up until they’re ready to meet, the ISA will be in charge of that and then once they’re ready to meet, they’ll pass them along to either the buyer or the listing agent.

Jenn Merlin07:26

Okay. So talk to us about every team member’s morning routine and what they do and what they’re accountable for.

Brian07:34

So right now, the way we have it set up is one of our buyer’s agents is in charge of FSBOs. So every morning he gets the new FSBOs that come in off of Vulcan7. He pulls those, he will cull those, add them to his list of already FSBOs that he’s following up with.

Jenn Merlin07:49

Okay.

Brian07:50

So he’s our FSBO guy basically. He’s working on them, keeping in touch with them every day. We have another person who does the expireds. Comes in, pulls the list of expireds from Vulcan, puts those added to her list that she’s already calling, and then we’ll go through. So the first week we call expireds three times a day. Second week we call them once a day. And then the third week we kind of alternate days. That’s along with doing the mailings and everything else that we’re putting it onto.

Jenn Merlin08:16

What time do they start calling?

Jim Wehmeier08:22

Go ahead.

Brian08:22

9:00 AM.

Jenn Merlin08:22

Okay.

Brian08:22

So we go into a bunker. So our bunkers are from nine to 12.

Jenn Merlin08:24

Wow.

Brian08:24

So everybody’s in a bunker from nine to 12, that’s when you’re doing your Lead Gen.

Ren Jones08:30

Gotcha.

Jim Wehmeier08:30

I think something else that’s key that we kind of left out is every morning we have a phone call, 8:45 something calls out and then it is something that says, “This is what I’m doing for today.” So it’s kind of an accountability thing for everyone to help everyone else.

Jenn Merlin08:47

Right, right.

Jim Wehmeier08:48

And when you see me walking around in someone else’s bunker, then I get yelled at and says, “Go back to your bunker.”

Jenn Merlin08:55

Who’s responsible for yelling at you?

Jim Wehmeier08:57

It’s really a whole team accountability and everyone has the right to make sure that we’re protecting and respecting everyone else’s time during that nine to 12 mark.

Jenn Merlin09:08

That’s awesome.

Ren Jones09:09

So it creates that focus and everybody has an intention or a goal for the day of what they’re trying to accomplish.

Jim Wehmeier09:15

Well yeah, because it’s your daily activities that meet your goals for the week, that meet your goals for the month, that meet your goals for the year.

Ren Jones09:21

And how do you track numbers? Do other team members see the other people’s numbers or goal? What they’re…

Brian09:28

So we have a form that we use. It’s a Google doc. Basically it shows a person then all the activities that we’ve done for the day. We turn that in. Then there’s a scoreboard that we can all look so everybody can see who’s set the most appointments this week, who’s on track for their goals, who’s made the most calls, who’s made the most contacts. And it’s kind of like a fun little competition we have.

Ren Jones09:49

Awesome. Good. Good.

Jenn Merlin09:51

Are there prizes in this competition?

Brian09:53

Excuse me?

Jenn Merlin09:54

Are there prizes?

Brian09:57

Glory, just pure glory.

Jim Wehmeier09:58

Money.

Jenn Merlin09:59

Bragging right.s

Brian10:00

Yeah. Close business. If you’re doing the activities, you’re winning the scoreboard, you’re going to get the most closed business.

Jim Wehmeier10:05

Bragging rights.

Jenn Merlin10:06

Absolutely. How did you guys create that environment for your team? I’m sure you hit a few bumps in the road along the way.

Jim Wehmeier10:14

If you’re not hitting bumps, you’re not going anywhere.

Jenn Merlin10:16

Exactly.

Jim Wehmeier10:17

That’s the whole thing. It really is. Okay, to what you said earlier…

Jenn Merlin10:25

What works…

Jim Wehmeier10:26

We take what we can learn from going on those training sessions, what we did in Portland with Ben Kinney and then Chris Suarez and Adam Hergenrother. Those things, learning what they do and then making sure that it works for us. And then if there’s something that we can tweak or whatever, that’s what we do. I mean, there is always bumps in the road.

Jenn Merlin10:46

Absolutely.

Ren Jones10:47

So I hear three major shadows. Pretend for a moment that you didn’t go to those three. I mean, is there kind of big void, isn’t it?

Brian10:57

Yeah, I mean I think we’d be still struggling where we were. We’ve learned a lot of stuff as far as where we want to go, how we want to structure things. ‘Cause I think that was our biggest problem is we’re adding these pieces, but the structure wasn’t there until we learned from those bigger teams, give us some guidance as far as how we should structure expectations for certain roles, that kind of thing.

Jenn Merlin11:16

And best practices and things that they did?

Brian11:18

Absolutely.

Jim Wehmeier11:18

Well a lot of things too is we have coaches. There’s absolutely no way you can expect to get better at anything whether it’s sports or anything. Everyone has a coach. So Brian actually, he works with Seth and that is someone on Tim Hiles…that’s been with Tim Hiles since day one.

Ren Jones11:39

Oh my goodness.

Jim Wehmeier11:40

That’s his personal coach. And then we have a coach through Kelly Williams’s maps coach that we’ve been working with since day one when it was just one person doing two million or five transactions a year and now we’re where we are and they’ve been through it with us the entire time.

Jenn Merlin12:05

Do they coach the team or does each member have their own coach or are you guys each other member’s coach?

Brian12:12

So we have one coach who is our team coach. She kind of works with the leadership. I have one for the ISA side. And then we coach our teams within the team. So Jim is director of sales, also is our listings, also coaches the buyers agents. I will coach the junior associates until they pass over and go into the agent side of it. And then any other ISAs we add will be on my team. So I’ll be coaching them.

Jenn Merlin12:39

Okay. So that’s how you all divide up your duties?

Brian12:42

Yes.

Jim Wehmeier12:42

Oh yeah.

Brian12:43

Yes.

Ren Jones12:45

Fantastic. Great. What do you do for mindset for the team? I mean, you’ve got the bunkers, everybody’s going through their morning routine, there’s accountability. What about what else in mindset that… And how do you…

Jim Wehmeier12:58

Great question. So what we really focus on is we have a team meeting every Monday and we are constantly reading and putting things into our brain and the conversations that we have with each other are always focused on making sure everything’s healthy as far as… Because if you feel like you’re falling in one area of your life, it’ll bleed over to anything else.

Jenn Merlin13:22

Absolutely.

Jim Wehmeier13:23

So we have accountability sessions like I do with all of our sales team. And Katherine, who is our head of ops, has it with our administration. And it’s always something like, “Okay, how’s everything going on your goals? Now let’s take it a step further. How’s everything else going?” Just to make sure that everyone has the right mindset, because if we’re spending the most time with each other in this office, everyone has to have a healthy mindset because the minute you don’t, you’re going to know and say, “All right, we need to talk.” The books we read are very, very important. Those things are key to constantly feeding your brain the right thing.

Ren Jones14:03

Okay. So you got a lot of people reading. You recommend certain books and everybody’s reading different books?

Jim Wehmeier14:07

No, no, we all read together and then we discuss at our Monday meeting.

Ren Jones14:11

Oh really? Gotcha. A book and everybody reads it and talks about it.

Brian14:15

Yes. So we read sections and then discuss it as the team.

Jenn Merlin14:19

What’s the book, now?

Ren Jones14:21

What are the books?

Jim Wehmeier14:21

Go ahead.

Brian14:22

Right now we’re doing MREA, Millionaire Real Estate Agent.

Ren Jones14:25

Gotcha.

Brian14:26

We’re kind of doing that one once a year just to revisit it every year. And then…

Jenn Merlin14:30

That’s a good idea.

Brian14:31

We’ve done The One Thing. We’ve done Raving Fans, just anything that’s going to help the business.

Jim Wehmeier14:37

Anything from… I mean you’re still getting Tony Robbins and Jim Roan books.

Ren Jones14:42

Great.

Jim Wehmeier14:43

Those are all books that we read. It’s not just “Oh sales, sales, sales.” It’s like, “All right. Let’s talk mindset.”

Jenn Merlin14:51

Yeah. Cause what you put in is what’s going to…

Jim Wehmeier14:53

Raving Fans was one of my favorites.

Jenn Merlin14:53

…Come out.

Ren Jones14:54

So Raving Fans. So when you’re customers… So to create those raving fans, what are you guys doing? How do you know if you have raving fans? What do you, with your active times…

Brian15:05

We send a referral rate.

Jim Wehmeier15:05

Right?

Ren Jones15:05

What did he say?

Jenn Merlin15:05

The referral rate.

Jim Wehmeier15:05

Yeah. 90%. So we’ve got to be doing something right. I mean, we are keeping in contact. So there’s other opportunities. Who do we know that can help you and what you’re doing in your life? Right now, if somebody needs somebody to, “Oh, we need a maintenance man.” “Okay. That’s great. We have that.” We always call, it’s quarterly calls. We also, what we did is, we just got done doing, we rented out two movie theaters and we had people come in and it’s friends, family, and I’m a big kid guy, so it’s like going crazy, running around kids, here’s some Mountain Dew and then you send them home.

Jenn Merlin15:46

Oh nice.

Jim Wehmeier15:46

So I’m that kind of uncle, that’s what I do. So it’s just sit there, make sure you’re pouring into their family, making sure everybody’s doing great. But it’s really about staying connected with them and the like that is part of our Lead Gen too in certain days, or depending on what day you have set up…

Jenn Merlin16:05

Like if you’re calling and inviting them, you’re saying?

Jim Wehmeier16:07

Yeah, you send them out an email, you send them out a letter and then we call them.

Jenn Merlin16:10

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier16:10

Also. But we filled the theaters on both days.

Ren Jones16:13

Okay. What else are you doing to stay in touch with the database? So you have the theaters, you have….

Jim Wehmeier16:17

So we have the theaters and then we have something at least once a quarter. So in Thanksgiving, we’ll do a big pie. Last year we sent out for past clients and stuff like that, it was over 200 and I think it was 200 something pies that we’ll give them for…. And then they come in.

Ren Jones16:34

And a lot of people want to know what flavor pie?

Jim Wehmeier16:38

I can’t… Pecan won this year.

Brian16:40

Pecan was the big winner this year. Usually it’s pumpkin.

Ren Jones16:42

Pecan was? It was normally pumpkin. And we’ve got pecan…

Brian16:44

Pecan was the big winner this year.

Jim Wehmeier16:46

You can’t go wrong. It’s pie. You put enough ice cream on it, I can eat any pie.

Ren Jones16:49

Okay.

Brian16:51

As far as the way we stay in touch with everybody is we have a 36 touch program that we use so that we’re making sure that we’re touching them 36 times, especially our past clients.

Ren Jones17:01

So three times a month?

Brian17:02

Yeah, three times a month. One way or another. Either it’s an email, it’s a phone call, a letter in the mail, invitation to something. We’re making sure that we’re touching them and staying in contact with them.

Ren Jones17:12

And the reason… I’m glad you said that because a lot of people will set up these automated systems to do that and they skip the part where there’s actually a personal phone call or personal touch in there. You’ve got the movie theater.

Jenn Merlin17:26

Or party.

Ren Jones17:27

You’ve got the pie. They come in to get their pie, meet one on one, or a party, or a phone call. So that personal touch is key to it.

Brian17:35

Oh yeah. And I think one that we’ve implemented this year that we’re really trying to do is, if we’re in the neighborhood for a listing presentation or an open house or something else, we’ll make sure that we do a pop buy to our old past clients.

Jenn Merlin17:47

That’s a great idea.

Brian17:48

Little cup with some pens and just a little something to them. “Hey, we stopped by. Just wanted to say hi to you. Give your our thoughts.” That kind of thing.

Jenn Merlin17:56

That’s an awesome idea.

Ren Jones17:57

Who do you know that wants to buy or sell?

Jim Wehmeier17:59

It’s the same thing, if you think about it.

Brian18:00

Exactly.

Jim Wehmeier18:01

You’re going to have the normal people that just… It’s the same thing as when you’re marketing your listing. Most people will just put it in the multiple listing service and then just let it go. Our activities are a lot higher. And it’s also the same thing with our sphere. Our activities are a lot higher. We’re very proactive in actually reaching out and engaging with people instead of just sending out those emails.

Jenn Merlin18:24

Yeah.

Jim Wehmeier18:25

Well I think your average is 13% is what is opened of your emails.

Jenn Merlin18:33

Oh.

Jim Wehmeier18:33

That’s…

Jenn Merlin18:33

That seems high. What….

Jim Wehmeier18:37

Well as opposed to even when it’s a text message, it’s 90… It’s 93% on a text message.

Ren Jones18:46

Oh yeah.

Jim Wehmeier18:46

And a call… You’re leaving messages or something. And regardless if you talk to them, at least they know that you’re thinking about them.

Ren Jones18:53

Good.

Jenn Merlin18:54

Well let’s talk about what you do do to sell a listing. Can you go through some of those activities with us?

Jim Wehmeier18:59

Sure. Well first of all with Rachel and I, she’s our listing coordinator, we’re very proactive as far as reaching out to the other agents because just like all the scripts, you got to sell it. In order to sell it once, you got to sell it twice

Jenn Merlin19:14

Exactly.

Jim Wehmeier19:15

So it is directly contacting them, telling them about the open house, telling them what it features, what the price is, what’s sold around it, everything like that. The next thing is our buyers agents. We actually go and door knock and invite all the neighbors.

Jenn Merlin19:30

Great.

Jim Wehmeier19:30

Because we need traffic that first weekend. So our average days on market is 18 for 72 sales.

Jenn Merlin19:38

How many doors are they knocking?

Jim Wehmeier19:40

We are knocking anywhere, I believe it’s somewhere between 20 and 50.

Brian19:44

20 is the minimum, depending on the neighborhood. We’ve got some of these bigger neighborhoods where they’re acre lots, so you’re only going to knock 20 because otherwise they’re out there all day. The smaller neighborhoods in the city where they can knock 50 to a hundred doors in a couple hours, they’ll knock 50 to a hundred doors.

Ren Jones20:01

Nice.

Jenn Merlin20:01

So a minimum of 20 doors inviting the neighbors to the open house? Okay.

Jim Wehmeier20:07

So what else we do is, and this is where Brian and our agents come in, is you’re pulling up all of the circle prospecting. Okay, so it is a minimum of calls of 250 calls.

Jenn Merlin20:20

250.

Jim Wehmeier20:20

So just to make sure that if you didn’t get door knocked because you’re outside of that range, you’re getting a phone call. We just need the traffic. We need the people to know, we want our neighbors to help us sell the house.

Jenn Merlin20:31

Are you calling them again when it goes under contract or when it sells or…?

Brian20:35

Oh yeah. So we’ll do the 250 calls for the open house and then once we have it under contract, we’ll do usually an under contract. Who do you know that’s looking to move? And then once it’s actually closed, then we call. And that way we can tell them the price, “Hey we went this much over budget, this much over asking. Who do you know that’s looking to move? Are you willing to sell your house? We have people that are actually looking in the area.”

Jim Wehmeier20:59

It’s perfect timing because this is an example of… This is great, because this weekend we went on with three of them, three active, and we sold them all. Two of them we had… The big one was we had 14 offers.

Jenn Merlin21:15

Wow.

Jim Wehmeier21:15

We had 37 showings and a day and a half. That doesn’t include the people that came to the open house. And I was there for that. So it was another 38 people there. So 14 offers and it went $15,500 over list price.

Jenn Merlin21:33

That is awesome. You get a clap for that. Good job.

Jim Wehmeier21:37

And then the other one, we had eight offers and it went… So it went $15,400 over list price. And that’s both because of the generation. That one had 27 showings over the weekend besides the open house.

Jenn Merlin21:55

That’s amazing.

Jim Wehmeier21:56

Our average days on market is 18. The market is 74. But over those 72 listings we average 100.2% of sales price.

Jenn Merlin22:06

That’s amazing.

Ren Jones22:07

Creating some great demand there and the sellers are lucky to have you. So yeah, five stars there. I’m sure they’re sending you a lot of people. We’re at that time to do some Q&A. I really like this first question from Julie Hummel and I want to thank you, Julie, because she’s plugging the fact that Vulcan7 does work phone numbers and nobody else does. She says, “When you contact for sale owners and expireds and don’t reach them at home, do you call them at their office at Vulcan7 as the work number?”

Brian22:36

Absolutely. We call every number that we can get. So whatever numbers Vulcan7 puts in there, we call and then we make sure to call them all multiple times.

Ren Jones22:45

Good.

Jenn Merlin22:45

Are you texting too?

Brian22:47

We are.

Jenn Merlin22:48

And door knocking them?

Brian22:50

We are texting. We have not started door knocking the expireds, but we are mailing to them now.

Ren Jones22:56

Okay.

Jenn Merlin22:56

Oh nice.

Ren Jones22:57

Alan Withman.

Jenn Merlin22:59

Hi Alan.

Ren Jones22:59

From your team.

Jenn Merlin23:00

He’s on our team.

Ren Jones23:02

He says, “Do you find that calling expireds at nine o’clock works while others call them at 8:00 AM?”

Brian23:08

Yeah, we call them two times a day. So at the night at 12 and then we call them again from four to six.

Jenn Merlin23:15

Oh that’s a good time.

Brian23:16

We find that those are the two most successful times. We’ll even on the first week, we’ll call them during the lunch hour, see if we can catch them at their lunch. So we’ll call them three times that first day. And yeah, we found pretty good success.

Jenn Merlin23:27

And you text them too, that first day?

Brian23:31

We usually text them the second week.

Jenn Merlin23:32

The second week, you add on it?

Brian23:35

Regular prospects we’ll text the first day or anybody that comes in through a paper click. But yeah, for the expireds we usually text them the second week.

Jenn Merlin23:42

When are you mailing?

Brian23:44

That first week.

Jenn Merlin23:44

The first week.

Brian23:46

Yeah. Postcard with our stats on it. And then also a handwritten letter.

Ren Jones23:51

Michael Cars asks… That’s kind of a long question. “When you say you call three times a day, first week and second, two times a day the second week, how often are you actually speaking with the expired versus leaving a voicemail? What do you do with an expired that never answers the phone and doesn’t respond to the voicemail you leave?

Brian24:09

So the way we’re working it is, we will call them until we get to talk to them. Once we talk to them, we’ll put them in our database and we’ll put them on a campaign. As far as if they don’t answer, we keep calling until we get some kind of answer. If not, they’ll go in our old expireds and we’ll kind of save them and then go revisit them a month later, two months later and continue calling. But we don’t leave a voicemail every time. So we’ll leave a voicemail the first call and then maybe a couple days later we’ll leave a voicemail. The rest of the calls, we don’t necessarily leave voicemails.

Jenn Merlin24:40

If Vulcan has the email, are you emailing too?

Brian24:45

We have not emailed yet. We have not been emailing the expireds.

Jenn Merlin24:49

Okay.

Ren Jones24:51

Carla Fay says they’re in the bunker and calling two. No, it’s machine gunfire. That’s why they’re in the bunker. No. Who do they call if they’ve explained that? How big is your database? She wants to know that. How big is the database?

Brian25:05

Total, it’s probably, between all the agents, because we have it broke down… So we have the team database and each agent has their own. I think we’re around like 4,000 people contacts in our database.

Ren Jones25:15

That’s a good number.

Jenn Merlin25:15

That’s excellent.

Ren Jones25:16

And then of course all the geographic calling in the area.

Brian25:20

Which it just adds… So the goal is to be, through our area prospecting, for every hundred calls we make area prospecting with Vulcan, we should be getting 20 contacts… For every 20 contacts, we should get two to five database adds.

Jenn Merlin25:34

Oh, that’s a lot. Okay.

Ren Jones25:36

Great.

Jenn Merlin25:36

Can we hear from you Jim, one of the sphere of influence calls? Will you give us a little sample?

Jim Wehmeier25:42

Okay. So like a good friend or…?

Jenn Merlin25:47

Sure.

Jim Wehmeier25:47

I mean, it is really to catch up. So you want to call me? Go ahead.

Jenn Merlin25:52

All right.

Brian25:53

Call her.

Jenn Merlin25:53

You’re calling me.

Jim Wehmeier25:54

Okay, call her. Ring ring.

Jenn Merlin25:57

Hello?

Jim Wehmeier25:58

Hey Jenn, it’s Jim Waymire, how are you?

Jenn Merlin26:00

Oh hey Jim. Good, how are you?

Jim Wehmeier26:02

I’m doing great. Hold on. So I’ll have their thing… I’ll have all the last contact information pulled up.

Jenn Merlin26:10

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier26:11

And what we talked about last time.

Jenn Merlin26:12

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier26:13

So that’s basically what my conversation is around. So hey, so what’s going on today? Anything? How’s work going?

Jenn Merlin26:20

It’s great. Okay, so you just go through it and then do you ask for a referral or how do you…

Jim Wehmeier26:24

Of course, yeah, that’s what I’m going for. But it’s really… So last conversation we had. So how’s the kids doing? Everybody good?

Jenn Merlin26:31

Fabulous.

Jim Wehmeier26:32

Did they get over that sickness?

Jenn Merlin26:33

Yeah. Yes. Everybody’s well.

Jim Wehmeier26:35

Right. Great. Hey, I saw last time we talked you were actually looking to do some renovations. Did you guys get everything taken care of on that or is there anything I can help out with there?

Jenn Merlin26:45

Oh, okay, I see. So that’s where they say I need a plumber.

Jim Wehmeier26:48

Yeah.

Jenn Merlin26:49

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier26:50

Yep. Oh great. So Jenn, before I let you go, we’re always looking for an opportunity to help the people that we’ve helped in the past. Do you guys, have you heard anybody from work or family that maybe looking to buy herself?

Jenn Merlin27:05

Oh yeah, my sister is.

Jim Wehmeier27:07

Great. Is there an opportunity that I can maybe reach out to her, if you could give me her contact information? I mean, first I would want you to call her and let her know that I’m going to be calling her.

Jenn Merlin27:17

Okay.

Jim Wehmeier27:18

Would that be something That would be okay?

Jenn Merlin27:20

Yeah, sure.

Jim Wehmeier27:20

Great.

Jenn Merlin27:21

So now are you the only one asking for referrals? Or are other people…?

Jim Wehmeier27:25

Our whole…

Brian27:26

Everybody is.

Jim Wehmeier27:27

Everyone on our team calls their database.

Jenn Merlin27:30

Their database, okay.

Jim Wehmeier27:31

Yes.

Jenn Merlin27:32

What about throughout the transaction?

Jim Wehmeier27:35

Okay, so throughout the transactions on, and this is something that we’re very, very purposeful on. Mondays at four, Thursdays at four, I’m calling every client that I’m working with and just catching up, “Hey, how’s it going? Do you have any questions about what’s going on in the transaction or with the listings? So here’s what happened. Here was the activity over the weekend. Here is properties that went under contract near you.”

28:09Combined with the agents that showed it that weekend. This is what it’s going on. I’m in direct contact with the agents that are showing… We can get pretty generic on the feedback that you leave. “Ah, I’m not interested. Two out of three.” I’m like, “Okay, great.” So really it’s about digging deeper so I can give the right feedback to them. And I think that’s what really helps out our days on market. Because if I’m talking to them and actually knowing a little bit more about digging deeper into what their feedback says, then that changed the mindset of our sellers. It’s like, “Okay, so based off of why do you think it’s overpriced? What are you seeing out there that is showing us that we’re overpriced?”

Jenn Merlin28:45

Yeah. What else did they buy if they didn’t buy this house?

Jim Wehmeier28:46

I mean, if we’re three days over on market and they say it’s overpriced and I’ve got 15 showings in three days, chances are we’re not overpriced.

Jenn Merlin28:54

Exactly.

Jim Wehmeier28:55

Chances are it’s probably under contract.

Jenn Merlin28:56

So it sounds like you’re answering questions of the client that you know they’re going to ask. You’re getting in front of them calling you, which probably makes your life a little bit easier.

Jim Wehmeier29:05

Well, and that’s the whole thing is what’s the biggest thing? The biggest complaint is? Well we never heard from them.

Jenn Merlin29:12

Communication.

Jim Wehmeier29:13

That’s all it is. It’s setting up the right expectation for your clients.

Jenn Merlin29:17

Absolutely. You guys are doing a great job, sounds like.

Ren Jones29:21

I know this is exciting.

Jenn Merlin29:22

You’re going to do 300, not two.

Jim Wehmeier29:25

And another thing that when you set those calls up, and this is big, this is something, when you set those calls up for Monday and Thursday, or whatever day works for you, those are perfect opportunities especially when you’re going, “Hey, we’re under contract. It’s Monday, we just went on, we’re accepted.” The very best opportunity to get a referral right there.

Jenn Merlin29:48

So you just say, who do you know that we can help?

Jim Wehmeier29:51

Made your seller’s day. I just made my seller’s day, sold their house for $15,000 more. And I’m saying, “Hey, who you know know?”

Jenn Merlin29:57

Who else do you know that needs $15,000?

Jim Wehmeier30:00

Yep. And that’s an expectation that I have when I have a listing appointment. I tell them I’m going to be asking them for a referral.

Jenn Merlin30:08

Wonderful.

Jim Wehmeier30:09

That’s in order for me to know that I did a great job for you guys. By the end of this transaction, I’m going to ask you for a referral four or five times. And really it’s more because I’m talking to them every Thursday.

Ren Jones30:23

Well I mean that’s the thing that a lot of agents don’t do this. They don’t ask for the business until after they’re closed. No, you’ve got a pending…

Jim Wehmeier30:29

That’s the worst part because they’re so busy.

Jenn Merlin30:31

That’s terrible.

Ren Jones30:33

A pending client in conversations with people. We just sold our house. Oh you sold your house. Well so and so’s thinking about selling their house. Because they’re talking about their moving plans, they’re in conversations with everybody else.

Jim Wehmeier30:45

Well it’s just like the car. You put it out on your rack. You go buy a yellow car, a yellow Mustang, and you don’t even realize how many there are. And when you get one you’re like, oh they’re everywhere.

Jenn Merlin30:55

Yeah, everyone has one.

Jim Wehmeier30:56

It’s the exact same thing. It’s crazy when you become a real estate agent, I can hear a real estate conversation from across the room in a crowded room and I’m like, “Oh, I need to go talk to them.” You know, you can just do it because it’s always listening for it.

Jenn Merlin31:10

Yes.

Ren Jones31:12

And yeah. And if every week that it’s pending for those five to six weeks, if you ask them for business, you’ve trained them. Now they’ve closed, you start calling them once a month or once every two months.

Jim Wehmeier31:23

Yep. Yep.

Ren Jones31:23

They know why you’re calling.

Jenn Merlin31:24

Yeah.

Jim Wehmeier31:25

Well the big thing is too…

Ren Jones31:26

Who else do you know?

Jim Wehmeier31:27

Exactly.

Brian31:27

Exactly.

Jim Wehmeier31:28

So once you’re signed, this is a conversation I have with them… Once we have a signed agreement, and this just happened last night. We have a signed agreement, and then I say that expectations. I said before this transaction is over, that’s how I’m going to know that we did a raving fan. We created a raving fan. It’s the opportunity to get in front of your family and friends.

Jenn Merlin31:50

Yeah, you have to replace yourself.

Jim Wehmeier31:51

I slid that over to him and he wrote one out, and I’m going to call him today.

Jenn Merlin31:54

Nice.

Jim Wehmeier31:56

And that’s the first time. But really to get them to agree, you say, “Does that sound like something that you guys can do?” And then they both look at each other and they say, “Yeah, we’ll be able to give you somebody.”

Jenn Merlin32:07

Right.

Jim Wehmeier32:08

Then that’s perfect. Because if it doesn’t happen by the end of the transaction and you’re still in contact with them, as soon as they call, they know. As soon as you call them, they’re like, “Uh oh, got to get that referral to him. Who do I know?” It is exactly. It’s like training them.

Ren Jones32:23

Yeah. They are trained.

Jenn Merlin32:24

That’s awesome.

Ren Jones32:24

Yeah. We’re going to do two more questions and then we’re going to thank you. I’m going to paraphrase it. William Miller, basically what he is asking is after you’ve called expireds for sale owners, your database, done called around a listing or a sale or whatever… I mean, agents run out of people to call. For whatever reason, they run out of people to call.

Jim Wehmeier32:41

I think it’s just their limiting belief. There’s never a running out.

Jenn Merlin32:46

Oh, you call anybody.

Ren Jones32:47

I mean, you’ve got too many people in your market. You can always call around a listing or sale. Not necessarily your list. If you only have four listings or four sales, call around the company ones.

Jim Wehmeier32:57

Yeah. How many does your office have?

Ren Jones32:58

Well, we just listed, we just sold.. Keep on going folks.

Brian33:03

Well, and then I’ll tell you, one of the biggest things we call for is for our buyers. It’s one of the perks that we do for our buyers is if they’re looking for a certain area, we’ll call that area. So if we have a buyer looking in a certain neighborhood, we’ll pull the numbers and just call that neighborhood for buyers looking.

Ren Jones33:18

And it’s a hot business. When you have somebody that says, “I want to live in this neighborhood.” And you call, I mean the batting average on that is so high.

Jenn Merlin33:24

Yeah. How many listings are you taking as a result of that each time?

Ren Jones33:27

Yeah. You get listings and sales.

Brian33:29

Yeah. Oh absolutely. You get both sides of it. Yeah.

Ren Jones33:31

It’s huge. Last question from Facebook. Emma, I don’t think she’s a Vulcan7 client. She says, “I’m brand new to the industry. What can Vulcan offer a new agent?” So basically what the question I guess is if you’re calling, if you’re brand new and you’re calling expireds and for sale by owners, should they? Should a brand new agent do that? Should they call expireds and FSBOs?

Brian33:56

That’s the easiest way to grow your business the quickest. I mean, those are people right there waiting. They’re…

Ren Jones33:59

They have a house for sale and no agent.

Brian34:02

They’re already interested. They’re already thinking about it. They’ve already tried it. Yeah. They’re raising….

Ren Jones34:07

What I would say back to her is, if you do that Emna, you want to get some old expireds because the batting average for a new agent on an old expired runs a lot higher than being on the front lines.

Jenn Merlin34:20

‘Cause people aren’t calling them.

Ren Jones34:21

Yeah. ‘Cause people aren’t calling them. The skill level required on an old expired is not quite as high. And you can have some success right out the gate.

Brian34:28

Oh yeah. Cause then you’re the only one calling. All the other reasons agents have fallen off the side. So you’re the only one calling. You don’t have any competition. That’s great.

Ren Jones34:35

Good, good. I appreciated everybody and this has been wonderful. I’ve got to do these last little plugs. If you’re watching on Vulcan7 and you want to get involved with the Lead Gen Facebook group, they are at facebook.com/groups/gotobjections.

Jenn Merlin34:52

Its an awesome group.

Ren Jones34:53

Yes.

Jim Wehmeier34:54

Very helpful.

Ren Jones34:55

49,000 people. I want to mention that Aaron, who runs the group, he’s a real giver, he’s got a program called ExpiredMasteryElite.com. And finally, if you’re watching on Facebook and you’re not yet involved with Vulcan7…

Jenn Merlin35:12

Do it. Do it now.

Brian35:12

Absolutely.

Ren Jones35:15

Sign up at vulcanseven7 the most important thing. If you’ve done your job, like Jim and Brian, they’re in the bunker. They’re making these calls, they’re setting appointments, they’re blowing it up. They’re going for the 260 stretch goal. After about four or five hours of that, take a break. Go to the freezer, get some delicious Graeter’s mint chocolate ice cream.

Jim Wehmeier35:38

Don’t do that. I will eat that whole thing.

Ren Jones35:40

Don’t miss out on that.

Brian35:40

Yeah, right?

Jim Wehmeier35:40

Reward yourself.

Brian35:40

Absolutely.

Jim Wehmeier35:46

Reward yourself. Get some delicious Graeter’s mint chocolate chip, you’ll…

Jenn Merlin35:49

Or the black cherry is good.

Ren Jones35:49

The black cherry’s good.

Jim Wehmeier35:52

I’m a Reese’s guy.

Ren Jones35:54

This has been great guys. I’m glad we got together and can we see how you’re doing in the fall, see if you’re just hitting your goal or you’re onto the stretch call?

Brian36:05

Absolutely.

Jenn Merlin36:06

They’re going way beyond stretch.

Ren Jones36:07

You’re going way beyond stretch? Good. We appreciate it a lot.

Brian36:11

Well thanks for having us.

Ren Jones36:13

Thank you for joining us and hopefully we’ve given some… With all the great ideas here, hopefully that’s added a listing or two this month or maybe March.

Brian36:24

That’s right, yeah.

Ren Jones36:25

People watching, they can apply that in March and have an even better year.

Brian36:29

There you go.

Jim Wehmeier36:29

Absolutely.

Ren Jones36:29

Make that car payment. Maybe make the mortgage payment.

Brian36:31

Go on vacation.

Jenn Merlin36:32

Take a vacation.

Ren Jones36:36

Fly first class. Upgrade that coach ticket. Upgrade the coach ticket to first.

Jenn Merlin36:40

Fly to St. Louis first class.

Ren Jones36:40

Fly to St. Louis for vacation at an Airbnb.

Brian36:45

There you go.

Jenn Merlin36:45

Thanks guys.

Ren Jones36:45

Thanks everybody.

Jim Wehmeier36:49

Thanks. Take care.

Ren Jones36:50

We’ll be back in seven days with another exciting guest who’s taking two, three, four listings a week. See you then everybody.

Brian36:56

Have a good day.

Jenn Merlin36:57

Bye.

Ren Jones36:57

Bye.

36:57